One of the great lessons of life that my father taught me as a young teenager was the importance of me finding and reading Good Books as well as The Good Book (The Holy Bible). I am so grateful that I followed his advice. Following his guidance has been one of the greatest things that I could have ever done in preparation for my adult life. He would always tell me that each one of us will always have our own individual preferences, positions, political affiliations and agreements which is all well and good. However, he warned,…“don’t become so narrow minded that you close your mind to learning why the other side of your preferences feels and thinks the way they do.” It was good advice.
One of the great books of history as regards personal responsibilities and freedoms was written by a British philosopher named John Stuart Mill. The title of this book was “On Liberty.” Permit me to tell you the story and circumstances surrounding its publication.
John Stuart Mill was born in the year 1806. He was mostly home-schooled and educated primarily by his own father, James. James Stuart, like so many of the parents of the day, viewed his own son as a sort of heir to his personal planned legacy, that of his personal philosophical throne, position, and platform for recognition. John was an extremely brilliant and talented youth. His father taught him Greek at age three and Latin at age eight. For certain he was “ahead of his time.” His father James and his friend Jeremy Bentham lead a group known as Philosophical Radicals, or Utilitarians, who openly expounded many of the ideas that John Stuart Mill would later articulate.. Many of his thoughts and platforms particularly discussed the notion that the greatest happiness of the greatest number of people should be the central goal of any system of government.. As an adult, John Mill worked as an examiner at the British East India Company. Fortunately, the demands of his position were such that he had enough spare time to devote to his first love–political philosophy.
“On Liberty” is arguably Mill’s most important and influential work. In it, he attacks the democratic political ideals that result in “the tyranny of the majority,” an expression he borrowed from the French thinker and author, Alexis de Tocqueville. For Mill, mindless commitment to majority rule that fails to protect minority rights is a form of tyranny no less oppressive than absolute monarchy. Indeed, he argues, it can lead to a bleak conformity. Mill attempts to establish standards for the relationship between authority and liberty. He emphasizes the importance of individuality which he conceived as a prerequisite to the enjoyment of the higher personal pleasures of life.
Mr. Mill’s discussion in “On Liberty” pertains to civil or social liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual. Much of what he had to say within his work is as applicable today and resonates within our society as it did when it was first published. The topic matter of his work deals primarily with the liberties and the limits to be placed on any restraint of the individual freedoms of our citizens.
One very simple principle discussed at length in his work discloses his position that it is only just to interfere with the liberty of an individual if they are causing direct harm to others. Critics of his work openly raise questions as to the nature of harm to others and what comprises it, but also to oneself, and, consequently the appropriate levels of regulation of individual behaviors.
For John Mill, the basic principle that societal and governmental relationships to individuals should be based on the “harm principle.” Stated simply, every person (except for children or those living in primitive cultures) has the right to act as he or she wants, so long as the action harms no one else. As Mill put it, in a ringing endorsement of individual rights, “In the part [of human conduct] which merely concerns himself, his independence is, of right, absolute. Over himself, over his own body and mind, the individual is sovereign.”
The entire doctrine laid out within the contents of his publication encompass his established standards which include his three basic liberties of individuals, his three legitimate objections to government intervention, and his two maxims regarding the relationship of the individual to society.
A powerful corollary to Mill’s concept of individual sovereignty is his impassioned defense of freedom of expression. He was convinced that without freedom of expression there could be no human progress; even ideas considered wrong by a majority might have a grain of good or of good value in them. Above all, free discussion allows people to examine their personal beliefs through debate, thus avoiding mindless dogma. As he notes in “On Liberty,” “We…recognize the necessity to the mental well-being of mankind (on which all their other well-being depends) of freedom of opinion, and freedom of the expression of opinion.”
“On Liberty” was a greatly influential and well received work though it did not go without criticism. Some attacked it for its apparent discontinuity with Utilitarianism, while others criticized its vagueness. The ideas presented in “On Liberty” have remained the basis of much liberal political thought. The publication has remained in print continuously since its initial printing and release in 1859.
Learn More, Know More, and Become More…………..